Fandon Mashup | Those of Wit and Learning

Fandom Mashup is an original featured created and hosted by the lovely Micheline @ Lunar Rainbows Reviews. Each week she proposes a unique fictional scenario and then invites you to build a dream team of five fictional characters from five different fandoms to help you to complete the task. Make sure you check out Micheline's blog for more info!

This week we're choosing five characters whom we think belong in Ravenclaw! Ravenclaw's my Hogwarts House, so this was a lot of fun...

Evelyn 'Evie' Carnahan from The Mummy (1999)

I will never, ever be bored of The Mummy; it's one of my favourite films and a lot of that is down to this lady. She's bookish and scholarly and learned, but also adventurous and brave, and she isn't mocked for her enthusiasm by the people who matter. Evie wants to be an academic, so she'd definitely be in Ravenclaw.

Belle from Beauty and the Beast (1991)

Any woman who can get as excited about a library as this woman does belongs in Ravenclaw. The 2017 Belle also belongs in Ravenclaw, especially being an inventor, but I prefer the original and the 2017 Belle looks an awful lot like another Hogwarts student...

Cosima Niehaus from Orphan Black

Cosima is a proud nerd and super smart, and while I'm sure Ravenclaw is full of bookish people I think the kooky, more Luna-esque people are sometimes forgotten about. Ravenclaw will have as many scientists as more artsy lovers and I think Cosima would find a lot of like minds there willing to help her with her experiments.

Samwell Tarly from Game of Thrones

He and Belle can nerd out over the Hogwarts Library together, and if Samwell could go to boarding school it'd mean having time away from his horrible father.

Elizabeth Bennet from Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen

We know Elizabeth loves books, but that's not the reason I'd put her in Ravenclaw. For me Elizabeth is a character who encapsulates 'Wit beyond measure is man's greatest treasure'. She loves to play around with speech, is constantly verbally sparring with other people even when, like Mr. Collins, they don't realise it. She'd definitely be at home in Ravenclaw.

Who would you put in Ravenclaw?

Monthly Wrap-Up | April 2015

Is it just me or did April fly by? It went so quickly! It's actually a little scary how quickly 2015 seems to be going, so I try not to think about it too much. Things at work got a lot busier last month, but I still managed to read quite a bit and have a pretty good month!

Ms. Marvel, Vol.2: Generation Why by G. Willow Wilson, Adrian Alphona and Jacob Wyatt (4 Stars)

Reviewed here!

Copperhead, Vol.1: A New A Sheriff in Town by Jay Faerber, Scott Godlewski and Ron Riley (4 Stars)

Reviewed here!

Well-Read Women by Samantha Hahn (5 Stars)

Fables, Vol.1: Legends in Exile by Bill Willingham, Lan Medina, Steve Leialoha, Craig Hamilton and James Jean (2 Stars)

Reviewed here!

Little Beach Street Bakery by Jenny Colgan (3.5 Stars)

Reviewed here!

American Vampire, Vol.2 by Scott Snyder, Rafael Albuquerque and Mateus Santolouco (4 Stars)

Reviewed here!

We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson (4 Stars)

American Vampire, Vol.3 by Scott Snyder, Rafael Albuquerque and Sean Murphy (4.5 Stars)

Reviewed here!

The Jane Austen Book Club by Karen Joy Fowler (2 Stars)

As you can see I'm still loving graphic novels - in fact I enjoyed all the ones I read bar one - and I was able to read a bit more work from Shirley Jackson and Jenny Colgan. Very, very different authors, but I enjoy both of their books!

GAME OF THRONES IS BACK AND I AM VERY NERVOUS.

I'm very, very, very worried about Sansa and I want to take her away from all of the creepy men in her life. I want her and Arya to let Brienne take them to Dorne, and then I want the three of them to stay there in the land where they don't hurt little girls.

STOP HURTING HER!

As always I'm tired of the constant female full-frontal nudity. Do we get to see any dicks? Nope. Now I'm not saying I want to see a dick because, sorry boys, they're not particularly attractive, but I think it's only fair we get male full-frontal nudity, too. I'm sick of the way women are treated in this show, and I know a lot of people wonder why I watch it if there are so many issues with it, but the truth is none of these issues are going to be solved if we all just turn a blind eye. If something's wrong we have to acknowledge it and try our hardest to fix it, not just pretend it isn't there.

On the completely opposite end of the scale, I also watched the 1995 adaptation of Sense and Sensibility last month. I'm probably never going to get around to reading all of Jane Austen's books because unfortunately I've never really enjoyed her books that much, but I do enjoy the storylines whenever I've watched an adaptation in the past. I love Emma Thompson and Kate Winslet, and it was certainly a nice film to sit back and watch, but honestly I found it a little boring and I didn't particularly like the ending. I feel like both Marianne and Elinor deserved better.

I bought myself the season 2 boxset of Orphan Black and I've been watching that again, along with my Dad, in preparation for season 3 which isn't in the UK yet. Boo! It's such a good show, and so far my Dad seems to be enjoying it, too, which is quite something! I think I get my fussiness about TV shows from him...

This has nothing to do with watching Season 2, this is just one of my favourite Felix quotes.

Oh, and my brother-in-law went to see The Avengers: Age of Ultron. I thought it was alright. It was entertaining enough to watch but I'm not a massive superhero fan, although I do love the new Ms. Marvel comics. I'm more of an X-Men girl than an Avenger girl.

I had a great blogging month in April. I took part in the A-Z Blogging Challenge for the very first time and I did it! I was really proud that I actually managed to schedule my posts so I was never typing something up at the last minute, and though I missed a few days (three, I think - I couldn't think of any authors whose surname began with Q, U or X) I wrote something for the majority of them. The only thing I really failed at was regularly looking at other people's posts, which is very naughty of me, but to be honest I just wanted to take part in the challenge to see if I could do it, and I could!

Because I was on such a blogging high I wrote a bunch of other blog posts, too; not only for April, but for this month, too. I have a lot of posts scheduled already, which is good because May's going to be a very busy month at work.

It was Easter last month - hooray! I had a pretty quiet Easter, not that it's a holiday I've ever done anything special for, it was nice to get a few days off work. My sister and her family came to visit and on Easter Sunday we all went to Folly Farm, which is a diabetes-inducing name of a local zoo/farm. There's everything there from pigs to giraffes to lions to owls, and it was a really nice day weather-wise, too!

I found myself in Swansea a couple of times last month, too. For any of you who might not know I live in south Wales, and one of my friends from my MA course recently moved back to Swansea (she did her BA there, but her MA in Lancaster like me!) so it's been nice to have a friend nearby. The two of us went to a book launch together - the launch of New Welsh Short Stories, published by Seren Books where I work! - and then on the last Sunday of the month I travelled through to Swansea to go to a new book club that my friend has started.

There were six of us in total who turned up - which actually worked out really well because we read The Jane Austen Book Club by Karen Joy Fowler, which just so happens to have six main characters! - and while I knew two of the ladies already, one of them being my aforementioned friend, I also met some really lovely new people. It was a lot of fun, and I'm looking forward to the next meeting where we'll be discussing Terry Pratchett's Monstrous Regiment!

The book club doesn't have a theme exactly, but those of us who attended the first meeting are all really interested in gender, feminism and sexuality, so if that sounds like your kind of thing and you happen to live in the south Wales area why not join us? You'd be more than welcome! Check out the Facebook and the Twitter.

How was your April?

My Favourite Sci-Fi Heroines | Sci-Fi Month 2014

Sci-Fi Month continues! Today I'm going to be talking about my personal Top 5 Science Fiction Heroines. I love me some female protagonists, in fact if I pick up a book while I'm out shopping and I don't find the slightest sniff of a female character in the blurb I will not buy that book. I've got nothing against male protagonists, but I'm 23 and I'm tired of sausage fests.

Linh Cinder from The Lunar Chronicles by Marissa Meyer: I love The Lunar Chronicles. Since reading Cinder I've become a lot more confident in reading sci-fi, and Cinder has become one of my favourite heroines. After spending so many years convincing myself that I wouldn't be welcome in the science fiction fanbase, it always seemed so male-orientated when I was younger, it's been a real joy to stumble across a series like The Lunar Chronicles, which has not one, but four heroines. There's a heroine for everyone in this series, which I love, but Cinder is most definitely my personal favourite.

Cosima Niehaus from Orphan Black: Another story with a heroine for everyone. I started watching Orphan Black earlier this year and I love it! Tatiana Maslany is the most amazing actress and I love all of the clones, but there's just something about Cosima which always makes her the first clone I think of when I think about the show. She's adorable; I love her passion for science and I really wish my hair looked like hers.

Georgia Mason from the Newsflesh trilogy by Mira Grant: For those of you who have been following my blog for a while this should come as no surprise. I adore the Newsflesh trilogy, and after reading Feed earlier this year Georgia quickly became one of my favourite heroines of all time. Who knew anyone could love a journalist so much!

Sarah Connor from the Terminator series: I grew up watching the Terminator films with my Dad, and no matter how many times I watch it I never get tired of Terminator 2. What I love about Sarah is that she's actually incredibly flawed, and yet she's still an incredibly competent, resilient, tough lady. For an action heroine of the early 90s she's awesome; she isn't put into a box as a hardcore, emotionless bitch, but she's also far from typically feminine. I have a lot of time for Sarah Connor, and I was very disappointed when she didn't make an appearance in Terminator 3!

Inara Serra from Firefly: Ah, the show that was cancelled before its time. Like Orphan Black, this is another show with a cast of characters who are difficult to compare because all of them are likable and dislikable for completely separate reasons. I love the women in Firefly; Kaylee is adorable, Zoe's fantastic and River's a sweetie (albeit an annoying one). Any one of them could have made my list, but what I love about Inara is the way she challenges the stereotypes we have surrounding sexuality and getting paid for one's 'services'. Plus she always wears the prettiest dresses.

Are there any heroines of sci-fi that you love?

What's Up Wednesday! | 16/07/14

What's Up Wednesday is a weekly blog hop created by Jaime Morrow and Erin L. Funk as a way for writers and readers to stay in touch!

What I'm Reading

At the minute I'm reading Margaret Atwood's The Penelopiad, alongside my friend Laura, and I'm really enjoying it so far! It's a sort of retelling of The Odyssey from Penelope's POV, but between each chapter there is a poem or a song or a monologue from the POV of Penelope's 12 hanged maids, acting as a Greek chorus. I'm really enjoying how Atwood is twisting the various things we know about Penelope and Odysseus, and Greek mythology in general, and I recommend it!

Next week I'm going to be taking part in The Underhyped Read-A-Thon - I wrote a blog post about it with all the information you need to know here! I think it's a great idea for a read-a-thon, a chance to read some of the books on your shelves that have been forgotten by the rest of the reading world, and I've set myself the challenge of only reading books with less than 1,000 ratings on Goodreads.

What I'm Writing

I'm currently working on one of the climactic scenes of my WIP, in which a murder is committed, for the sake of my portfolio. I'm hoping I can finish a decent draft of the scene today and then send it out to some of my course mates to get it critiqued!

Recently I've also been revisiting a couple of vague ideas I had - one for a middlegrade novel and another for a YA novel - though they are very, very vague. Neither of them really have a particular plot or strong characters, but for now I'm trying not to let them distract me too much. I need to focus on my WIP!

What Inspires Me Right Now

I think knowing that I'm going home for a couple of weeks this Sunday is pretty inspiring - I'm looking forward to a change of scenery and some of my parents' cooking!

What Else I've Been Up To

Once again this week I haven't been up to much aside from working on my portfolio and job hunting and panicking about the future. I also finally got around to watching the season 2 finale of Orphan Black, and now I'm really looking forward to season 3!

Next week I'll definitely have more to talk to you about, because I'm going somewhere very exciting on Saturday!

What's new with you?

J.

Top Ten Tuesday | Favourite Movies/TV Shows

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly feature created at The Broke and the Bookish. Each week you compile a list of ten books which coincide with that week's theme. You can find out everything you need to know about joining in here!

This week's theme is 'Top Ten Favourite Movies or TV Shows' - it's a chance for us bookworms to share some of our other favourite stories which happen to be told through a different medium. 

I decided to stay away from any book adaptations, even though there are a few that I love, so without further ado, here's my list!


Beauty and the Beast (1991)

I am a Disney nut, so obviously at least one Disney film was going to be on this list and it had to be this one. Why? Because not only is Beauty and the Beast my favourite Disney film, it's my favourite film period. I love this film so much and I'm never going to grow out of it; in fact people who claim they've grown out of Disney are just as bad as people who claim you can grow out of YA. Stories are stories no matter how old you are.

Avatar: The Last Airbender (2005-2008)

Honestly a lot of the films and shows on this are going to be ones from my childhood/teens that have stayed with me, and this is one such show. Can you believe it's turning ten years old next year? This show may be animated, but it's not only for children. This show is just gorgeous and it explores some really mature themes without talking down to its audience. If you love character-driven shows and you haven't watched this yet then I recommend it. It's just beautiful story-telling!

The Mummy (1999)

This film is another one of my all time favourites, and it's just so fun. When it was originally released I was only eight and I don't think I watched it until I was at least ten or eleven, which was probably for the best; the scarab beetles terrified the life out of me when I was younger.

The Mummy has a little bit of everything. It's got action, adventure, humour, romance and a fantastic female lead - what's not to like? Plus Brendan Fraser and Arnold Vosloo aren't too bad to look at, either.

Firefly (2002)

I didn't actually get around to watching Firefly until this year, but I always knew I was going to love it. Who knows why I waited this long to watch it; perhaps because I'm very lazy when it comes to tv shows (I really have to force myself to watch them sometimes) or maybe because the show was cancelled, and I was reluctant to become invested in something that was going to end sooner than I'd like.

Usually when I watch shows with a relatively big cast of main characters I'll have one or two that are my absolute favourites, but what I love most about this show is that I love all the characters and I'm not sure that I could pick a favourite. This show is so much fun and there's a character for everyone - if only it hadn't been cancelled!

The Tudors (2007-2010)

This show is the kind of show that polarises people. There are those who love it despite its flaws and there are those who are too invested in historical accuracy to enjoy it. Now I love me some historical accuracy in my fiction and dramas, and I'm well aware of this show's flaws - in fact I'm as willing to point them out as someone who hates it - but what I love about this show is the way it humanised all six of Henry VIII's wives.

When it comes to famous historical figures it's so easy for us to look at old, stiff portraits and think we know everything about the person in the picture. What this show did was give Henry's wives, and Henry himself, as many likeable qualities as unlikeable ones. This show reminded its audience that these people, though they lived 500 years ago, were still people, and as someone who writes historical fiction I can't help but appreciate that.

Friends (1994-2004)

It's so bizarre to think that this show started a month before I turned 3 years old. 20 years on and it's still being enjoyed and watched, and if that's not the mark of a good show then I'm not sure what is.

I discovered Friends during my teens, a couple of years after the show finished, and my best friend and I watched it and loved it whenever I slept over. Like Firefly, this show is another show in which there's a character for everyone, but I love them all. It still makes me laugh, and if I'm ever feeling down, sad or depressed all I have to do is stick on an episode of this and I feel better.

Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl (2003)

Did this film really come out 11 years ago? Bloody hell.

I feel very lucky in that, as a child of the 90's, I got to witness the releases of Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings, the Harry Potter series and the Pirates of the Caribbean films during my childhood and adolescence. I've no doubt in my mind that these films were formative.

The Pirates films are so much fun. I know I've said that for several of the films/shows on this list, but I guess that's just what I enjoy to watch. If something isn't fun then why watch it? These films made pirate stories cool again, and they introduced me to Captain Jack Sparrow, my one true love.

The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993)

Here we have another Jack, and this one sparked my life-long admiration for Tim Burton's work. I was only 2 years old when this film came out so obviously I can't remember its release, but watching it is a constant memory throughout my childhood. I loved this film when I was little (and still do) and I can't remember a Halloween or Christmas when I didn't sit down and watch it.

To this day it's still my favourite of Tim Burton's films, despite the fact that he didn't direct it, and I'll be watching it again as soon as October rolls around!

Pan's Labyrinth (2006)

I don't think I've met anyone who watched this film and didn't love it. Watching this film reminds me of the feeling I got reading Grimm's Fairy Tales when I was younger; it's dark, spooky, melancholic and hopeful, and frankly I don't watch enough non-English speaking films.

I think Guillermo del Toro's a brilliant storyteller, and I continue to love his work.

Orphan Black (2013-present)

Orphan Black's another show I didn't start watching until this year - in fact I accidentally marathoned the entire first season in the space of 3 days - and I'm in love with it. Tatiana Maslany is amazing at what she does and, like Firefly and Friends, I love all the clones so much that I find it hard to pick a favourite.

What I really love about this show is how it's addressing themes such as a woman's right to her own body and what she does with it, and right now I think it's so important that we're talking about it; especially when there are still people out there who think they have the right to shame women into having or not having abortions, or think that it's justified to blame a woman when she is a victim of sexual abuse.

I just think this is a very important show, and it addresses all these issues so beautifully while maintaining an excellent story and gorgeous character progression.

So what are some of your favourite films and/or shows?

J.

What's Up Wednesday! | 18/06/14

What's Up Wednesday is a weekly blog hop created by Jaime Morrow and Erin L. Funk as a way for writers and readers to stay in touch!

This week I'm back to participating in WUW after taking a week out last week, purely because last week was so boring there was nothing worth sharing with all of you lovely people!

What I'm Reading

After a horrible slump brought on by a sudden onslaught of uni work, this week I've slowly started to get back into reading. On Monday I read Polly Bloom's Old Wives' Lore: A Book of Old-Fashioned Tips & Remedies, which is a little non-fiction book that does what it says on the tin. It probably sounds like a bit of an odd read, but for someone who's currently writing a novel about a woman who works as a healer this book was actually full of some pretty useful information. Not to mention it taught me that haemorrhoids may have played a part in the outcome of the Battle of the Waterloo...

I'm hoping I'll get back into Mira Grant's Deadline this week as I haven't continued with it for over two weeks now! It's not the book's fault at all, I'm loving the Newsflesh trilogy, uni just got on top of me for a while and every time I considered reading for fun I felt as though I wasn't allowed. It's not a good feeling.

What I'm Writing

This week I'm actually going to be having a go at writing one of the climactic scenes of my WIP, which seems a little crazy considering I'm not there yet in terms of where I am in the draft. Not only have I been advised to include one of the climactic scenes in my portfolio for my MA, but recently I've been really stressed (thus my lack of reading etc.) and it made me fall out of love with my WIP. My wonderful coursemates have made me start to fall in love with the idea again, and I think writing one of the scenes I'm really excited to write will help me to write the rest of the novel, too!

I'm also working on a steampunk short story, in which a middle-aged librarian mistakenly sets an assassin on himself, which has been lying around unfinished for far too long!

What Inspires Me Right Now

The other writers on my MA course - they're amazing!

What Else I've Been Up To

Today one of my friends turns 24, so we're spending the day in town looking at all the pretty things we can't afford before a group of us go out for some Thai food this evening - I'm really excited for a stir-fry!

I haven't been up to too much this past week, other than stressing about the future as I so often do - there's something so uneasy about being in your 20's and having no idea where you might be a year from now, but when the thought of life after uni isn't making me want to be a bit sick it's pretty exciting. I just hope I can find a job I can dive straight into; the last thing I want is to be moping around in unemployment.

Other than that, I've started watching the second season of Orphan Black, and I've been incredibly excited since I discovered that Marissa Meyer will be releasing a new book, Fairest, in January, which will delve into the backstory of Levana. You can find out more about it here!

What have you been up to?

Spring TV Wrap-Up!

Today I'm going to do something a little different and talk about some of the shows I've been watching recently. I don't consider myself a TV buff at all - I tend to read more books than watch shows, and I'm envious of people who can dedicate their time to so many different shows and keep on top of all the characters and plotlines.

What I tend to do when it comes to TV is wait until a series is finished - either entirely, so that I have a few/several seasons to watch, or just the first season so I can get a taste for it and see what I think - and then watch it, rather than watch it as soon as it comes out. I'm lazy when it comes to TV, and it's really easy for me to grow disinterested; a show has to be really good to keep me waiting for a new installment each week, so I prefer being able to marathon an entire season over the course of a few days.

So far this spring I've finished four shows: Channel 4's New Worlds; BBC's The Crimson Field; Hannibal Season Two and Orphan Black Season One.

Let's get the worst over with first, shall we?

I decided to watch New Worlds after I saw a trailer for it advertised at my campus cinema and realised it would be on TV when I went home for Easter in April. From the trailer it looked like it was going to be pretty epic.

As you might have guessed from my love of historical fiction, one of my favourite things to watch on TV is a good historical drama, and I particularly love anything set in the 16th or 17th centuries. New Worlds is set during the reign of Charles II and takes place both in England, where the English are growing tired of Charles's tyranny, and across the ocean in Massachusetts, where the colonisers are trying to break away from English rule while also fighting against the Natives for their land.

What I thought was going to be the first season of a long series turned out to be a Mills and Boon-esque four part mini-series, with terrible character development and a plot which fell flat despite having so much potential. This show was a real disappointment and I really wouldn't recommend checking it out.

Thankfully I had three other shows over Easter to keep me going: Hannibal, The Crimson Field and Game of Thrones - I won't be talking about Game of Thrones here because season four hasn't finished yet!

Luckily for me where Channel 4 failed the BBC stepped up. This year marks one hundred years since the start of WW1, so over Easter the BBC broadcast a six-part drama, The Crimson Field, which follows a group of women who travel to France to work as volunteer nurses.

I really enjoyed this show, so much so that I'm hoping there's going to be more of it in future! Despite only being six episodes long, it used those episodes wisely to include as many stories - from the early management of shell shock to the punishment of deserters - and as much character development as possible without making the show feel crowded. 

I'd definitely recommend it, whether you're a fan of historical dramas or not!

Last week saw the finale of the second season of Hannibal; a show that has become one of my all time favourite dramas on television since its premier last year. Following the first season's amazing finale, the second season follows Will Graham's pursuit for justice by any means necessary - even if that means teaming up with the very man who incriminated him in the first place...

My love for this show knows no bounds. Not only is it a brilliant reimagining of Thomas Harris's stories, with both male and female three-dimensional characters, it's also visually stunning. Even if you've never read the books or seen the films, everyone is aware of Hannibal Lecter, and despite the fact that the show deals with something as brutal as murder and cannibalism it's still a piece of art in its own right.

The end of the second season was just as shocking as the end of the first, and I can't wait for season three! If you haven't checked this show out then I highly, highly recommend it, though the second season in particular might not be an enjoyable watch for the squeamish.

Hannibal came to an end the same weekend in which there wasn't a new Game of Thrones episode, so to stop myself from pining too much I decided to pick up where I left off when I started watching Orphan Black some time last year.

I watched the first two episodes of the first season last year, and even though I liked what I watched I didn't love it enough to continue watching it. The past couple of weeks, however, I've been seeing it all over Tumblr, so I decided to give it a try and I ended up marathoning the rest of the first season - from episode three to episode ten - in the space of about three days!

The show follows Sarah Manning, a con artist whose life is turned upside down after she witnesses the suicide of a woman who looks exactly like her.

I enjoyed this show so much more the second time around; Tatiana Maslany is an amazing actress and I loved the story. I'm a big fan of stories which feature any form of science vs. religion, and as someone who's just starting to get into sci-fi this show was perfect for me. I'm not quite ready for alien races and spaceships, but a sci-fi thriller I can handle.

One day I'll be ready for space. One day.

I haven't started watching the second season of Orphan Black yet but I will be soon, and I'm hoping to continue watching American Horror Story: Coven, another show I watched the first two episodes of and have enjoyed so far. I'm rather picky when it comes to shows involving witches, somehow they always end up cheesier than I'd like, but so far AHS isn't shying away from the darker side of witchcraft, and I love that.

As far as other shows go I'm also planning on sating my lust for historical dramas by finally watching Vikings and Spartacus: Blood and Sand. Ever since I went to see Pompeii a couple of weeks ago I've been craving something else gladiatorial and I've heard great things about Spartacus - I love a good rebellion story.

I'll be back with another TV wrap-up in the summer!

What have you been watching recently?

What's Up Wednesday! | 28/05/14

What's Up Wednesday is a weekly blog hop created by Jaime Morrow and Erin L. Funk as a way for writers and readers to stay in touch!

What I'm Reading

Right now I'm a little bit over halfway through Deadline, the second book in the Newsflesh trilogy, and I've already cried. I'm loving this trilogy so much, and it's recently revealed something that I definitely did not expect. I'm probably going to have to go out and buy myself a copy of Blackout once I'm done with it; I have to know how this story ends.

It's also been a while since I picked up Maria V. Snyder's Scent of Magic, which I started pack in April. I'm hoping I can finish it and read Rainbow Rowell's Fangirl in the next couple of days, before I make a start on my June TBR, but that all depends on what kind of mood Deadline leaves me in.

What I'm Writing

I've been a bit bad this week in terms of writing and haven't really done any. I think what I really need to do is sit down and actually write out a proper plan for my WIP. I know it's pretty shocking that I don't already have one, but because I know where my novel's going I've always just been writing towards that point. Now, though, the story has expanded so much compared to what it once was so I need to organise all of my subplots before I drive myself mad.

What Inspires Me Right Now

For some reason I always struggle to think of an answer for this section of WUW, and then I see someone else's and I'm like 'damn, why didn't I think of that?' For whatever reason I find it difficult to pinpoint something as a definite inspiration, and sometimes I think we just can't be inspired but we need to make things anyway. Half the struggle of making any art form - whether it's writing, painting, singing, photography - is pushing yourself to do it when you're not feeling inspired. So I guess what inspires me is that every book lining the shelves in the book shops is there because someone slaved away at it, no matter how inspired they were.

What Else I've Been Up To

Last Friday was the Hannibal finale, and now I have to wait another year for season three. On the plus side there's going to be a season three so I suppose I can't really complain. I think I speak for all of us in the Fannibal family when I say we're all still pretty emotional.

Over the past few days I've managed to marathon the first series of Orphan Black. I started watching this show back when it first came out but, for whatever reason, I didn't carry on after episode two. I kept seeing it all over Tumblr, though, so this week I decided to pick up where I left off and I really enjoyed it. Tatiana Maslany is an amazing actress. If you're into sci-fi/thriller shows then I recommend checking it out!

One of my friends has also recently got me into an online game called Town of Salem which is deadly when it comes to procrasination. I don't know why it's so addictive but I've been enjoying it. It's a game in which you're given a role in the town, but no one else knows your role and you don't know anyone else's and it's a race to see whether the Town, the Mafia, or the Serial Killers win. It's surprisingly fun.

Other than that it's been pretty quiet/boring here. I'm off to the cinema tomorrow (what a shock) to see Maleficent, which I'm really excited for, and I'm hoping to go and see the new X-Men film soon, too.

What's new with you?